


The expectations of many

by Merya



Series: Guilt and Solace [1]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Emotional Hurt, F/M, Family Loss, Survivor Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-17
Updated: 2015-04-21
Packaged: 2018-03-23 09:49:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3763588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merya/pseuds/Merya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The explosion at the conclave robbed her of her freedom, her future and so much more, and it seems that she can find no time to mourn her losses. When she is finally pushed to the breaking point the maker-damned commander will not leave her alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The background story of the Trevelyan Inquisitor, is that he/she is at the conclave with relatives, yet there is no mentioning of these relatives in the game itself. So-uhm - this is my inquisitor trying to deal with all this shit that's happening to her.

Sarah Trevelyan, Herald of Andraste, Hope of the world, was yet again walking the paths of Haven, trying to ignore the green hue of the sky and the lingering gazes of the villagefolk. Heading out of the gates and towards the frozen lake, she avoided looking in the direction of the training recruits, knowing that what she would see there, would create another little crack in her heart.

The events following the explosion at the conclave had sent her mind reeling. The expectations and hope laid at her feet. She had not had time.  
She had set a grueling pace, thankful for the continuing demand on her efforts and the amount of bears in the Hinterlands. Guiltily thankful for the warring templars and mages, that took all her effort to wipe out. Thankful for the cuts and scrapes and near-misses that kept her mind focused solely on surviving. She had never been one to talk much, but the frenzy with which she threw herself at her work left her exhausted, and not fit for company. Varric would try to draw her out with jokes and stories. When her eyes lit at the mention of the Champion of Kirkwall, he threw every joke and story he had at her, but her mind would invariably drift, and she would lose focus on the story. She knew that he worried. 

Scouring the countryside in the Hinterlands for rebel mages, they came upon an abandoned hut. Having been in the field for well over 3 weeks now, they had developed a routine - always checking abandoned buildings for anything useful. At first she thought the letter was a curious thing. Why leave a letter to your brother in a hut, that was clearly abandoned. But as she read the note, her mind turned on her. Images of her older brother, arms big and strong, holding her as she cried when her kitten died. His booming laugh, when she finally managed to climb on top of the kitchen roof. The way he had sneaked food past their mother, when she had been punished for acting “unladylike” yet again. All the small things, the memories, came rushing in as the letter had slipped from her fingers and she was fighting to suppress the images she knew were coming.

Janus waving goodbye to her, as he followed the string of people that were attending the negotiations. A smile on his face, and a promise of a celebration when the proceedings were over, on his lips. The blackened bodies in the temple, reaching towards the sky, their mouths open in endless screams. The blackened eye sockets. The melted bodies. The green hole in the sky that had swallowed everything. 

The letter drifted from her hands, as she pulled her hair, trying to force the images from her mind, but only succeeding in making them more real. She could smell him - the way he used to smell when they sat in the kitchen after morning practice, sweaty and earthy. He smelled like freshly baked bread and the security of home. She could feel the ragged, crumbling flesh of the one body she had touched at the temple before she realised what she was looking at. The flesh falling like dust from the face of someone’s son or daughter. She wondered idly, if that had been Janus, not able to force the images from her mind. Her head filling with a silent scream. 

She was thankful that it was Varric who found her. Cassandra and Solas had been harvesting elfroot in the garden, while Varric had kept a watch at the door. She didn’t know what had alerted him to her, but he found her crouching on the floor, boring her nails into her scalp and her eyes red from the effort of suppressing her tears. She startled when he touched her arm, but that anchor was all she needed to pull herself back together. To force the memories away behind locked doors, and carry on. She had to carry on. For him. She built her walls higher and thicker and pressed on, throwing herself at her work. Kept up such a grueling pace, that even Cassandra told her to slow down. “You are the most important of all of us” she said, while staring at a defiant Sarah. “We cannot afford for you to wear yourself down”. 

In his philosophical way, Solas merely shrugged. “With the pace we are going at now, none of us will be able to sustain ourselves for much longer”.  
“Come on, June.” Varric said, his voice almost pleading. “We need to sleep. We need to recuperate. I need to swill back a pint or two. It might do you good to do the same”.  
As Sarah surrendered, she saw Varrics shoulders sag with obvious relief, and the hard lines of Cassandras jaw slacken.  
They came back to Haven “for supplies” as Cassandra had put it, while Varric headed straight to his tent and disappeared for the rest of that day, loud snores escaping the cloth walls. Solas disappeared into the hut he shared with Adan, finding his cot, and searching out the memories of Haven in the fade, while Cassandra went straight to her office writing up reports. She would postpone the actual debriefing and the inevitable meeting in the war-room for a few days she said.  
And that left Sarah wandering aimlessly around the paths of Haven, trying to avoid the hopeful glances cast her way that made her feel as if the breach in the sky was echoed in her innards. The first few days she had tried to talk to people.  
To get to know them and to occupy herself. When he woke, Varric had told her stories of his time in Kirkwall, and she found that she was able to concentrate on his stories better than she had been in the field.  
Flissa at the tavern told her all about Haven and the people that lived there. Sarah found she rather liked getting to know Haven through the eyes (and gossip) of its inhabitants.  
Adan kept her busy mixing potions and gathering herbs, and she even got him to smile at her now and then with questions about his trade.  
Solas told her about his journeys into the fade, and she was fascinated, always asking for more stories. Cassandra talked to her about her family history and her own background and The commander… Well… She usually avoided the commander. She didn’t know how to handle someone who reminded her so strongly of Janus.  
\---

She didn’t even know when the idea had begun to form in her head, but that morning she had awakened, having dreamt of Janus screaming to her from the fade, and she knew she had to ask.  
Sarah was comfortable around the apostate mage, but that morning walking up to him had been different. Her feet dragged and her mind was filled with fade green fog and screams. Solas saw her coming and called out a greeting, but as she neared him his face was pulled into a frown. The herald looked as if she had seen a demon. Her skin white and clammy beneath her freckles. Her usually scintillating black hair, hanging lank and tired down her back. As she stopped in front of him, he merely raised an eyebrow and waited for her to begin.  
“I w.. was wondering” she haltingly began, and Solas almost flinched at the tone of her voice. The herald was noble born and bred. She never stammered. She always sounded certain of herself. But this… this woman in front of him, this was a woman he had never seen before.  
“I was wondering if… if it was possible.. to find someone in the fade?” She asked, her eyes cast down and her voice near a whisper. “Someone specific… someone d.. dead.”

Someone more astute than Sarah at that moment, would have noticed how Solas’ face fell, and his shoulders sagged. He looked her up and down before answering with a voice that was heavy with regret.  
“Such an action would be ill-advised, even for experienced fade-walkers. I presume you wish to contact someone who was at the conclave? Such a death could potentially make a spirit relive it’s death constantly. I will not... No - I cannot assist you in such a search.”

Sarah’s eyes darkened and Solas thought for a second that he heard her heart break.  
“Oh”...


	2. Searching for solitude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sarah Trevelyan is dealing (in a death-wish kinda-way), and the commander is being over-protective in an angry sorta-way.

It was that conversation that had sent her walking purposefully through Haven this morning, headed towards the frozen lake, her face wearing an expressionless mask. Passing the soldiers, she heard a voice calling after her. A voice she most definitely did not want to hear right now.  
Ignoring it, she reached the lake and stepped cautiously out on the ice. It seemed to hold. She usually found that training was an excellent method of suppressing her thoughts, and she had begun to challenge herself to more and more difficult tasks in order to focus her attention away from the dark corners in her mind. The ice on the lake should make for excellent training in perception and reaction. It would also provide some much needed time for her to find her center, and lock the memories away. And she would be alone. Blessedly alone.

She began to walk outwards, trying to put as much distance between herself and Haven as possible. Relishing in the silence of the lake, and the cold creeping up through the soles of her boots, she lost herself in the crystalline air and the sound of the ice under her feet. For a moment she could put the last months behind her, and simply be Sarah. The tiny cracks from the ice brought an almost physical sensation to her ears, and the few snowflakes that drifted on the wind felt like little kisses on her face. The sun filtering through the light clouds was reflected from the mirror surface of the lake, creating rainbow crystals of the snowflakes in the air. For the first time in weeks, Sarah felt a deep calm settle in her bones.

She had almost reached the middle of the lake, when she heard someone call out to her, and the horrible sound of ice cracking behind her, brought her harshly back to reality. Turning around she saw the Commander standing a few paces from the shore. Cracks of ice were beginning to form from where he stood, reaching outwards. She cursed under her breath. The fool had followed her onto the ice, wearing full armor. She had to go back.

She nodded to him once, and began cautiously making her way back to the shore on the now cracked ice. As she came closer, she could see the frown on the Commanders face, the anger emanating from him was almost visible in the air around him. Sarah stopped. She did not wish to be berated for her behavior right now. In fact she had been hoping to avoid the commander altogether. He made her feel uncomfortable, and she didn’t know what to make of him.

So she changed direction walking towards Master Taigen’s hut, ignoring the Commander’s irritated shout.  
She would reach the hut long before him, and that would buy her time. Time she would need if she was going to be scolded by someone looking astoundingly like her beloved, dead big brother. Time to center herself, and draw on the deep calm the frozen lake had embedded in her bones.

It was impossible for her to hide her tracks in the snow, and she knew that he would find her, so she chose not to try to hide. She sat on a boulder not far from the hut, looking towards the path, and soon enough she heard the heavy steps of the Commander coming up the path. He paused when he saw her, relief evident on his face before his scowl deepened into something she could not quite decipher.  
“What were you thinking?” His voice rang out among the trees, echoing off the cliffs. His stride determined and angry. “The ice is not stable, you cannot risk yourself!” He looked expectantly at her, clearly waiting for an explanation. When none came, his anger seemed to grow. “I cannot believe you could be so reckless with your life… So selfish…” His rant went on for some time, but Sarah stopped listening. She did not need reminding how important she was, and how everything seemed to depend on her. When there seemed to be a pause in the Commanders string of words, she simply stood up. “Are you finished?”

The Commander seemed surprised at her words. “I… suppose so?” He said, making it a question, lifting his hand to rub at the back of his neck in a gesture of confusion. He stood at the foot of her boulder, looking up at her, and she was once again struck by how much he reminded her of Janus. Her heart clenched, the locks she had so meticulously placed, breaking open. She squeezed her eyes shut, swallowing the bile at the back of her throat.

“I was trying to find somewhere to think” she said. “Alone”.  
His gaze held hers and he started to shake his head. “I cannot allow…” he started, but she quickly cut him off.  
“I am not some noble lady to be coddled”, she said, her voice sounding shaky. “I was in search for some solitude, and I intend to find it. If you are not willing to leave me here on my own, you are welcome to play guard, but I _will_ be alone”. And with those words she turned around, and began scaling the cliffs behind her, while the Commander simply stood staring after her.

As she reached the top of the cliffs, she sat down where he could easily see her, and turned her face away from Haven towards the Frostbacks in the distance. As if they had reached a silent agreement, the Commander stood guard at the foot of the cliffs, facing the path towards Haven, not once looking up to check if the Herald was still on her perch.

As the sun slowly descended towards the Horizon, the golden rays mixing with the green tendrils from the breach, Sarah finally let the memories of her childhood flood over her, sobbing into the hand that wore the green mark that she had come to hate. Her heart finally breaking under the reality of a world where she would be utterly alone.

The sound of her mourning was carried on the wind to the man beneath the cliffs, who stood an unmoving silent vigil as the hours drew on, trying his best to ignore it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure if I should expand this, or just leave it? I do have some ideas about Sarah's ways of dealing, and how her family is going to react to her new title, but ugh... Time is not something I have a lot of. 
> 
> Again - this is my first fic, and if you have any comments / helpful advice I would love to know.
> 
> Thanks!

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first ever fanfic. I've posted it before, but as i read it again, I wanted to edit it quite heavily, so I took it off, and am now uploading it again. 
> 
> I'm pretty shy and unsure of my writing, so please if you have any comments / helpful advice I'd love to know. 
> 
> Thanks.


End file.
